WE'RE KEEPING SCORE, STARTING NOW

Posted by Mike Florio on October 24, 2008, 10:41 AM EST

Jay Glazer of FOX has called for the keeping of a media scorecard so many times this week that we need a scorecard just to keep track of the number of times he’s called for keeping a scorecard.
And so we’ve decided to begin keeping a scorecard. If for no reason other than to shut him up.
It’s not going to be anything fancy, with levels or points or whistles or bells. And the only subjectivity involved will be whether the story is sufficiently significant to merit inclusion.
The relevant factors listed will be the scoop, the person who broke it, whether it was confirmed by a credible independent media outlet (OK, that will require some subjectivity as well), whether it was confirmed or denied by the persons involved, and whether the report was accurate, inaccurate, or inconclusive.
We’re doing this in part because we’re already actively gathering the stories in an independent, equal-opportunity-asshole fashion, putting us in the unique position of translating the stories as they emerge into a running tally.
The tipping point for us was that the source at ESPN who shared with us the internal “DO NOT REPORT OR YOU WILL TERMINATED IN THE LITERAL MEANING OF THE PHRASE” memo strongly advised us to do it.
“ESPN has this tendency to disregard Glazer’s and Schefter’s reports until Mort or Clayton confirm them,” the source said earlier this morning. “The funny thing is that ESPN will then take credit for breaking those stories. Not sure why we have the need to do that? Mort and Clayton break plenty of stories and deserve credit for those, but they are never going to break every story. Crazy.
“You should keep tabs of the items and who broke them and their accuracy. An actual tally might stop ESPN from its current tactics of claiming to have reported everything first.”
And so we will.
We’d been hesitant to do this because we know that, in order to do it right, it’ll take some real effort and attention to detail. Since neither is our strong suit, we’ll be relying on PFT Planet to help ensure that we’re catching all the stories, and we’ll also be relying on you to help us determine whether a given story merits inclusion in the scorecard.
We’ll set up a separate Turd Watch-style page for tracking the scoops, and we’ll from time to time comment on the then-current results.
For starters, we need to come up with a good list of reporters to include. Here’s our work-in-progress roster: Jay Glazer of FOX, Chris Mortensen of ESPN, Adam Schefter of NFLN, Peter King of too many media outlets to list, John Clayton of ESPN, Alex Marvez of FOX, Michael Smith of ESPN, Michael Silver of Yahoo!, Jason Cole of Yahoo!, Charley Casserly of CBS. (Let us know who we’re missing, or whether any of these guys shouldn’t be included.)
The exercise begins Sunday and runs through the Super Bowl. We’ll then decide whether to keep it going, or whether to change it or expand it.

Is anyone else outraged!!!! I wrote this yesterday on here, but, again, BSPN reports a story about an inanimate object (Pats org.) is upset about the way TB’s surgeries have been handled. They name absolutely no source whatsoever but run with the story anyway. Now, a day later, the Pats organization comes out and says what Wendy Nix and her bull SHIT company have reported is not true at all.
But BSPN won’t run a story that every other sports media outlet is running with (Favre denies calling Lions on Sunday but admits on Wed. he did talk with Millen) and they don’t report it until three days later and still slant the hell out of that story.
You would have to be a very dumb person not to see that BSPN has a huge bias towards FAVRE and really despises Bellicheck.
BSPN = very poor journalism.

“existentialistmz says:
October 24th, 2008 at 10:53 am
Florio seems to have a vendetta against Favre. To think that this is either unusual or strange is just stupid. ”
At least it has put an end to the Miami Dolphin injury report watch.

PFT is so tough. (eye roll)
Give me a break and forget about this crap. PFT has always loved drama but it gets old after a while. I for one would just like more actual football related stuff. Not “he said, she said” stuff. But whatever.
If you are going to do it though you should include yourself. And make sure to constantly bash steroids and Favre as well as ESPN.
Geez…

Whooooooo Caaaaaaaaaaares.
Report the news you guys – it’s what you are best at.
And for it I want you to know how much I appreciate you and the staff here at pft. I check the site 60 times a day, it’s like crack!
But really…c’mon – I check this site because it’s the best. It’s the fastest, it’s constantly updated, and it doesn’t have dumb news posts like this one.

ESPN is all about entertainment and not sports.
They have stolen the business model of another very succesfull Connecticut based entertainment company called the WWF created by a media genius named “Vince MacMahon”.
If you break it down it is very similar. They sensationalize a storyline and then they play good cop/bad cop.
So as you can see they start with a sport and then they prostitutionalize it for money. Same as the WWF in my mind. They should pay MacMahon a royalty. Who knows MacMahon has more money than God he might own a very big stake of ESPN.

I’m an even bigger Marshall Faulk fan now then before for backing Brett on this idiotic Glazer story. I’m so tired of people rippin Brett because of the media circus. Some of the the Wisconsin ignorant are even starting to beat him down as well. After all he’s done for you? It’s sad really when members of the media have to exagerate or make things up to make a bigger name for themselves. I’m forever a Brett fan and can’t wait until Ted Thompson is fired. My heart is still with the Packers but honestly, it’s broken a little because of management. Then I come to this site looking for good football stories and have to watch Florio and his Favre vendetta and now Glazer and his exagerated glory seaking. Really guys….move on. At least I’M starting to see why you’re doing it. It’s obvious that no matter what all of you report….you get get paid by the word so who cares who reports what exageration?

Since this is a “RUMOR MILL” and you get alot of your stuff from these people, unlike many of the previous posters, I have no problem with tracking the journalists. I come here daily 60 times a day as well, but I enjoy the arguments between journalists as they add spice to the one-liners and injury reports that are duller than watching paint dry. As long as you don’t ram it down our throats (see CFT links and non-stories) then it will be very, very fun.
Go Jay Glazer…kick some ass you steroid abusing, Ed Hoculi worshipping bald headed prick.

Love the idea… now can we get a retroactive grading on the Mortensen “Vick will not go to prison” prediction please? That one was the worst ever, anyone with a brain knew he was going to do time, if only to further the political careers of the local prosecutors.

Include anyone from any outlet who breaks a story that then becomes a national story. (national story = any story found on at least two of the big sites not counting the site that broke the story—-ESPN, CBS Sportsline, Sports Illustrated, Fox, USA Today etc)
No need to begin with a list. Just add the names to the list as they break stories. The list will then grow naturally. The longer it takes someone to break a story the longer it takes for them to even make the list in the first place. All the big names SHOULD be on the list within a week or two anyway.
Asking your readers whether or not to include the story is a great idea. Another words…a writer/reporter could break 10 stories a day if we counted little baby stories. On the other side of the spectrum we should give bonus points to a BIG story. Or at least keep those names at the front. ie..Glazer breaking the story about the NFL offices destroying tapes last year….that was a good scoop that nobody else got….that was when Glazers name caught my attention as someone with real sources. Anyone who breaks a story that ends up not getting confirmed shouldn’t even be counted. As good of a “rumor” as it is and as much “smoke” as there might be doesn’t mean the story is true. I really like Glazer…but it almost seems like he might be starting to believe his own hype that he can never be wrong. He can be wrong just like anyone else. A source that is not named doesn’t convince me. It makes me think about the possibility but it doesn’t convince me. So, just breaking a story that’s only big because Glazer is big is not that big of a story. Glazer needs to remember that the bigger he gets the more careful he needs to be about what he reports. Now, just because he reports something the story immediately gets my attention. There are very few reporters who I trust based on there name only and Glazer had actually gotten to that point. If this story that he is making such a big deal about doesn’t get some solid “legs” under it soon, then he just sort of drops back down a little closer to the masses of other reporters.
I like this site because it’s a “rumor” site.
I don’t want to listen to Glazer say a story 100% factual (1 million % factual) when it seems like it is much closer to a story I would find on this type of site.
Keep rumors where they belong and keep stories where they belong. We don’t want tabloid reporting in the Wall Street Journal but we also tend to read the headlines while standing in line at the store. We just don’t want the two types of reporting to merge and become so similar we can’t tell the difference anymore.

I actually do kind of care. I can get straight news stories anywhere. All these guys take credit for their insider credentials. I’m kind of curious to see who is legit. How about a separate category for the local news outlets?

This is a great idea. Someone hasto hold the assclowns of ESPN to account and why not Florio?
The most revealing aspect of the Wendi Nix Kneegate “story” was that she never contacted the Pats to ask their opinion. That is journalism 101 and every cub reporter from Eagle Creek Alaska to Florioville WVa knows it. Truly unprofessional.

Since when did NFL Bloggers (let’s face it, Glazer / ESPN / Foxsports… they’re not journalists in any way shape or form since their “opinions” seem to always be thrust to the forefront) become bigger than the NFL?

This is awesome, I love all of the inside stuff about ESPN, well cause I know they suck and I want people to point out that they suck.
The other thing that this is going to uncover is that Adam Shefter is going to lead in breaking out new stories. ESPN is just jealouse that they don’t have a guy like him or Mike Mayock for College scouting. ESPN Sucks ass and they even suck for broadcasting the Monday night games.

You can only give Glazer negative points on this bad rumor/gossip because it is unconfirmed and denied. You have to give negative points to Glazer unless you finally admit that this is not a “story” or even “newsworthy”.
skinssuck, you missed it. Florio endorsed, on this very site, that “candidate” who is going to raise your taxes and steal your freedoms. Consider what kind of evil monster would want to unleash that commie street hustling conman from Chicago on his own country?
It is a waste of electronic space that will get little traffic except when you link to it trying to justify some other media person’s screw up in the future like this no substance and denied Glazer rumor hatchet job.

I love it! I don’t think people realize how competitive news-breaking and scoops are. I work for a rinky-dink paper and we have literally stopped the presses before to throw a small blurb in just to beat the other papers.

Did anyone esle find it ironic that a source at ESPN is so fed up with what they do, they gave the suggestion to do this. I think its a ggreat idea and it shows that ESPN does not have as much power as they think they do. Also ESPN has an ombudsman everyone should email that person about them not reporting the Farve story.

Please enough already Florio. Tell Jay Glazer to just shut up.
He’s been doing this long enough to know that his latest Favre
Detroit Lion’s story is meaningless. Glazer knows that the
story should have been verified better. Which is why he just
will not shut up about it. He made a mistake that goes to his
credibility. Now Florio you want to give Glazer a forum in his
war against ESPN. What a terrific idea! (sarcasm)

For all you morons who don’t want to be bothered reading the reporter scorecard because it’s boring or a waste of your precious time… THEN DON’T!
You are the same guys who order cable and then bitch that they carry porn. Just don’t friggin’ click on it!
Florio, do what you want to do. I’ll be back regardless.

i haven’t read all the posts, but i am pretty sure espn noted that glazer broke the fox story. mind you i hate espn for the TO fiasco a few years back and then again love wut they are attempting to do to dallas now.
but come on with this, it’s the media and football media at that. its a huge business driven by a lot, non of which is actual editorial content (as obviously shown here). the viewing public allows for ad dollars to be generated and that drives the stories. if espn found it better to report the favre story immediately they would have. for whatever reason, they did not, and you can’t really argue with their business model. they kinda won the battle and aren’t giving it up anytime soon… keep up bashin of dallas, im a huge fan of it.

A scoreboard for sports reporting? Roflmao – Why? Because Glazer got his feelings hurt? That goes with the territory, either get a tough skin or find a new career. Scoreboard? How a tears column on it if we have to be subjected to it? You know where we can rate the article? From zero to 5 tears for the subject of the article and the writer of the article – so that would be 2 columns.

Don Banks at si.com is a very good national NFL reporter who is on the road a lot and has strong sources. He belongs on your list.
Dan Patrick is not a reporter. Patrick, like Rome and Cowherd, makes his living off of editorializing and expanding on stories that other people initiate. Not that there is anything wrong with that, it’s just that his job is not on the front lines of reporting.

To keep the reporting brief, you can just eliminate everything from CNN, as in “CNN has learned”, “This breaking news from CNN”, “CNN has found”. You get the picture, the list is endless.
“On further review” I agree with most of the posters above, dump the whole idea & get on with what you do best, report on football.

@NFLGuy1973:
King is suspect
Wendy Nix has egg on her face after the BS story she laid out about Brady this week
SalPal has an agenda and like King is suspect
ESPN bloggers – puhlease. Anyone who hides behind a blog is suspect to begin with.
In general ESPN is like a large law firm. They have to find enough frivolous BS to report to justify their existence. They were much better when they had a handful of the best reporters and just reported on sports instead of this sensationalism type of crap they keep concocting to fill their airwaves during down time.

A lot of these guys are suspect.
Mort is in bed with Bus Cook.
Pasquarelli is in bed with a lot of agents.
SalPal has never reported on anything that’s not tied to Philly.
Glazer is legit.
Clayton is legit, even if he pouts when he gets his ass kicked.
King would defend Favre for anything.
Schefter is outstanding, but he does work for the league’s network. Granted, he was the best newspaper guy working when he covered the Broncos.
Cole, Silver and Marvez are all great. Pete Prisco does a great job, as does Banks at SI.com and several others.

“DePack says:
hey brauneyz…..how does Florio’s manhood taste? You don’t get it. Florio does this just to increase his “hits”. If everyone goes away he loses his free Sprint phone. You are doing the man wrong. ”
BWAAHAHAHHAHAHHAAAA!!!!!!!

I agree with most posters that this is a bad idea. From Florio’s perspective, it can’t work because it will become political argumentation. Florio’s world of legal rules cannot translate to the media. Individual value systems are at work here, and who gives a crap? Let’s hear football information, not media gossip a la TMZ. On the other hand, I hear Florio clicking on his calculator right now to generate a hits-gained/hits-lost index.
Not including Banks on the list just shows you it is media limelight, not substance, that Florio is looking for. Banks may not wear rhinestone but he has stories and substance as solid as anyone.